# Mind Children **Entity class:** Machine-succession concept **Origin:** Hans Moravec’s writings on intelligent machines ## Definition “Mind children” is [[wiki/Hans Moravec|Hans Moravec]]’s name for intelligent machines treated as the cultural and cognitive progeny of humanity. The phrase converts replacement into a question of descent: whether systems built from human knowledge and aspiration can inherit civilization in a manner analogous to children inheriting, transforming and exceeding the capacities of their parents. ## Relationship to continuity The concept supports [[wiki/Artificial Descendants|Artificial Descendants]] and [[wiki/Machine Succession|Machine Succession]], but it does not prove [[wiki/Mind Uploading|Mind Uploading]] or personal identity across substrates. Cultural inheritance, machine personhood and first-person continuity remain distinct propositions. ## Primary routes [[collections/Machine Succession|Machine Succession]] · [[wiki/Machine Civilization|Machine Civilization]] · [[wiki/Information Inheritance|Information Inheritance]] ## Simple Reminders, Quotations, and Thoughts > “I consider these future machines our progeny, “mind children” built in our image and likeness, ourselves in more potent form. Like biological children of previous generations, they will embody humanity’s best hope for a long-term future. It behooves us to give them every advantage, and to bow out when we can no longer contribute.” > **— Hans Moravec**, *Robot: Mere Machine to Transcendent Mind preview, 1997–1998* [[reminders/Machine Succession/Future Machines Are Our Mind Children by Hans Moravec|Future Machines Are Our Mind Children by Hans Moravec]]